A few years ago, I needed a new car. I went looking at cars, and even test drove a few. I tried the Honda Civic, the Kia Sportage, even a Scion xB. I really liked the xB, but they wouldn’t budge on the price. After nearly giving up home, I test drove a Smart, and fell in love with it. From the size to the way it handled, I was hooked. Call it love at first site… but I had to have this car! I traded in my old truck, and talked the dealer down a few thousand dollars. I financed it for five years and ended up with a manageable monthly payment.
Buying a new car was quite the experience. I had never bought a new car before, and had no idea the paperwork required. I ended up financing through the dealership, and set it up so the monthly payments were automatic and the car would pay itself off in five years. I didn’t want to have to worry about it every month. The most fun was “wheeling and dealing” with the car salesman. Having had no luck with Honda, Kia, and Scion, it was a fun process going back and forth with the Smart dealer. We became friends, and still talk via email some three years later.
I mention this because of a new company based out of Barcelona called Everybodycar. This is a brand new concept and basically makes the car buying process similar to buying groceries… in bulk. The system is simple. It creates a pool of potential car buyers, the types of cars he or she may be buying, and then takes a maximum of six persons to the dealership to buy cars… in bulk. This helps everyone get a bigger discount. It also helps dealers reach sales goals and build stronger relationships with manufactures. Savings created thus far range from 10% and have hit as high as 25%. I was excited to save a few thousand on my car… imagine a 25% savings. I didn’t tell you how much my car was, but if I had saved 25% I would have saved nearly $5,000.
Everybodycar is free to the public, while car dealerships pay a monthly subscription. In the future, the program would be free for everyone involved.
“Group buying is fascinating because it’s a vast field. Now we’re selling cars but in the future people may be blue to buy practically anything this way,” says Carols Castano, co-founder of Everybodycar.
This is a great program, and I hope to see this implemented in the United States in the near future. Everybodycar is currently in Barcelona, but has immediate plans for expansion into the United States, Italy, the United Kingdom, and Latin America. Hopefully this will be a program I can take advantage of when I buy my next car.
